Build Your Own Spherical Garden
The Growroom, a plywood planter-pod from Danish innovation lab Space10, goes open-source to promote sustainable food production in cities. (Photo: Alona Vibe)
Space10, a self-described “future-living lab” located in Copenhagen’s trendy Kødbyen (“Meat District”), wants to change the way we look at food.
Or, to be more precise, Space10 wants to change the way we look at what’s on our plates now in preparation for what will potentially appear on our plates in years to come.
Last fall, Space10, in collaboration with architects Sine Lindholm and Mads-Ulrick Husum, unveiled Growroom, an art installation-cum-urban farming solution that somewhat resembles an alien space pod that’s been merrily dragged through a veggie patch a couple dozen times. Bursting with fresh herbs and veggies, the Growroom is indeed a room — or more of a partially enclosed chill-out lounge/greenhouse hybrid of sorts, an oversized planter that pulls double duty as a public pavilion large enough to comfortably accommodate a small crowd.
"We’re inviting you to step inside the growing green haven, smell and taste the abundance of herbs and plants, and hopefully it will spark passion about growing your own food in the future," explained Carla Cammilla Hjort, Space10's inimitable founder and CEO, when the Growroom first launched last September in Copenhagen.
Space10 unveiled Growroom, a clever spherical planter structure, at CHART Art Fair in Copenhagen. (Photo: Alona Vibe)
The Growroom made an undeniable splash when it debuted, “sparking excitement from Helsinki to Taipei and from Rio de Janeiro to San Francisco” to quote a press statement released by Space10. And with that, requests for more Growrooms started to pour in from around the globe.
And so, Space10 has shrunk Growroom and re-released it as an open-source design that’s now downloadable for free. In effect, with Growroom's detailed assembly instructions now publicly available through the Space10 website, anyone anywhere can build their very own spherical urban garden pod. (Plants not included, of course.)
Growroom is relatively easy and inexpensive to put together, so long as you can access a CNC milling machine to cut the various plywood pieces. (Photo: Niklas Adrian Vindelev)
Architect Sine Lindholm notes that the Growroom invites 'the visitor into an intimate world where only the visitor and vegetation co-exist for a moment.' (Photo: Niklas Adrian Vindelev)
“The original version was a pavilion that was meant to spark a conversation on how we move nature back to our cities and start to produce much more locally,” explains Simon Caspersen, communications director for Space10, in an email. “It was more of a design object and conversation trigger, but when we started receiving loads of request from people who wanted to buy it or exhibit it, I decided to open source it. In that process we figured that a 4x4 meter pavilion was quite big for most people, so the new version is much easier to transport.”
Measuring 2.8 meters-by-2.5 meters (roughly 9-by-8 feet) but still spacious to accommodate about four people inside, the slightly more petite build-it-yourself Growroom model is, in the words of Caspersen, “not only aimed at individuals but also at neighborhoods.”
On the topic of neighborhoods, those looking to take advantage of the customizable open-source design would benefit greatly from having a maker space, digital fabrication lab or CNC milling machine in their immediate neck of the woods.
While constructing your own Growroom is described by Space10 as being an affordable and “easy as 1,2, 3” endeavor (all that’s needed is 2 rubber hammers and 17 sheets of inexpensive plywood), not everyone has access to a computerized vertical milling device. As with other open-source designs that require specialized equipment, that’s the one potential rub with the design. (Maker spaces are, thankfully, relatively easy to locate.)
In exchange for providing the free design plans and instructions, Space10 simply asks that those who download and build a Growroom of their own to "give us a nudge on Instagram" with the tag #Space10Growroom.
In lieu of a backyard playhouse, why not get the kid interested in agriculture early by building a backyard vertical gardening sphere? (Photo: Alona Vibe)
While designed for space-strapped urban environments where access to fresh food is scarce, I can see Growrooms flourishing in the ‘burbs as a more space-efficient alternative to sprawling backyard veggie patches. Why not grow up instead of out to make room for other backyard features like a chicken coop, a swingset for the kids or a soundproofed mother-in-law pod?
Whether installed in a vacant lot in a dense urban neighborhood, standing as the herb-clad centerpiece of a community garden or positioned in a backyard at the end of suburban cul-de-sac, the aim of the Growroom remains the same: bringing fresh food closer to home.
“Local food reduces food miles, our pressure on the environment, and educates our children of where food actually comes from," says Caspersen. “The result on the dining table is just as fascinating. We could produce food of the highest quality that tastes better, is much more nutritional, fresh, organic and healthy.”
___
Source: Mother Nature Network by Matt Hickman (February 2017)
